Forspoken Reviews

Muy buen juego.

Good game, better than expected.

Play it. It’s fun. It looks great, the map is huge. There is almost a whole new map, ABOVE the main map. You get access as you play. As far as the main character, she’s x1000 better than any of the countless “roided up” Space Marines, that dominate gaming. Haters can suck a sick one, this game is good. See for yourself.

To start, I 100% this game. I cleared every location, mastered every spell, completed every side quest. This game has its ups and downs, but ho boy are those ups and downs extreme. This game makes me irrationally angry due to just how bad the pacing and story are compared to how awesome the combat is. Gameplay: Combat: 10/10 This game has one of the most unique combat systems and one of the most rewarding mastery or leveling systems I have ever experienced. The magic systems feel good to use, the vulnerablity/resistance system forces you to engage with every spell and the bosses all feel good, balanced, and difficult. Exploration: 9/10 Every location on the map has the reward for completing the location marked, be it equipment, stat boost, lore, etc. Locations are suitably unique, though some of the simpler ones get repetitive (looking at you familiars (but you get a pass because kitties)). The main gripe I have is that certain locations are inaccessible from the region they are listed in and must be accessed from a different region Traversal: 10/10 The traversal system is satisfying, lightning fast, and allows you to explore the massive world seemlessly. Gameplay: bonus points Easy pickup of consumables via ability: +1 Crafting system: +1 large inventory: +1 Optional endgame bosses: +1 Replayability of story bosses: +1 Abilities mapped to the same key so you accidentally use the wrong one: -1 Gameplay: 33/30 Worldbuilding: Map: 9/10 The map is massive, well thought out, and each superregion is unique from the others. The optional bosses are on theme and tucked away in the far reaches of the map, and the parkour sections are exceptionally well done, obviously handcrafted. There are certain places where the world just... breaks though (buh dum tss). Places that are just too high to reach, bad interaction with certain abilities, and parkour breaking when you hit a tiny rock doesn't feel good. Lore/Backstory: 8/10 Honestly, I didn't read much of the archive, but what Cuff and Frey discuss about each piece of lore as you obtain them gives enough of a sense of the true scale of just how much thought went into the backstory of the struggle that happened in Athia. It just wasn't compelling enough for me to really dig into it like I would with other games, but that is also partially the stories fault. Enemies: 8/10 It takes a while to figure out why the enemies look like they, but ho boy when you find out the payout is spectacular. Some enemies are stupid annoying though, such as every single bird and the boggarts. I just cant hit them. I know, skill issue, but hey this whole thing is subjective get off my back. Worldbuilding: bonus points Unique script (just a 1 to 1 cipher of english, but hey, pretty letters): +1 Enemy names that are so bizzare I can never remember them: -1 Colors: +0 but worth a mention. very colorful Worldbuilding: 25/30 Story: AKA where the game falls on its face Main quest: 3/10 I have never skipped cutscenes before. I skipped so many cutscenes in this game. The main redeeming factor is the plot twist. Gorgeous plot twist. Characters: 1/10 The characters in this game are annoying at best, self-contradictory at worst. Frey, the main character, is one of the most contradictory characters in the game. She goes on and on about how she isn't going to solve everyone's problems, then promptly solves everyones problems. There are still comments from her about how she isn't the hero in the post-endgame quests. The sole and singular compelling character in this game is Cuff. The inanimate jewelery. How delightful. Pacing: 0/10 This game has the worst pacing I have ever encountered in a video game. The first hour and half of the game takes place in new york. in a fantasy/magic game. Why. Then the chapters are so disjoint, every boss fight has its own chapter. A single playable cutscene hyas an entire chapter devoted to it. You gain access to the last magic tree right before the final fight, which means if you want to go level those skills you have to break your immersion entirely to go take an in-game day to yourself to prepare for the final fight. Idiotic. Player agency: 0/10 I only include this section in games with multiple endings. This game has one singular choice that leads to the two endings. 1: finish the game. 2: don't. There is literally a choice in game to just not play the final fight and go back to new york. There isn't even an achievement for picking this choice. Why. Story Bonus points: One of the greatest and most unexpected plot twists I have encountered in gaming: +5 Insufferable characters: another -1 because they all just suck. Story: 7/40 Final bonus points: Placing the curios shop with fundamentally gameplay altering mechanics and purchasables in the middle of nowhere where most people won't even find it until engame 100%ing cleanup instead of at the beginning of the region you go into at the start of act 2: -10 This decision makes me so irrationally angry that I actually alt+f4ed the game when I found the shop and just went to bed for the night. The QOL upgrades in that shop should have been available and easily accessible so much earlier. Final score: 56/100. Do not play this game unless you just want magic go BRRR. It isn't worth it.

I beat the game in about 70 hours because I was being somewhat completionist about filling out her skills web and getting as many of the cool cloaks and accessories as possible. The entire skills and inventory system was very innovative and fun to fill out. But the main thing is this game had hands down the best magic system experience I have ever had in a game. Really just absolutely beautiful and inspired. Battles were always just gorgeous to be a part of. My only criticism was that I wish the dungeons (which are peripheral to the game and not necessary to beating it) were less repetitive and I wish Cuff didn't have a British accent. Otherwise, this is an A+ game and I'll probably replay it at some point.

As a female gamer and cat lover this game was more fun than expected. I loved gathering up all the cats and having them come along for the adventure. There were some quirks that annoyed me with the gameplay itself like magic parkour not activating while climbing etc, but overall I really enjoyed the game and the storyline.

It's definitely a game that was a victim of bad reviews and the face of being a video game that was made fun of by YouTubers everywhere nonstop. The criticism from YouTubers is somewhat immature when you actually play this game as they came off as quick to judge, and they've missed out on some redeeming factors. Playing this game first hand, I saw all the pros and cons to this game. I do have to disclose that I stopped halfway though in this game. Not for the same reasons YouTubers would give you, but because the story seems so out of place and asking to be stretched out after Chapter 6. Fighting Tanta Sila should have been the last thing we do, not a boss battle in the middle of the story - especially if this was what the story was building up to since the beginning. Pros: - The spells are so fun and easy to learn, even when they're level one. If you take your time to learn the spells and know how to use them, you will win your boss battles easily. - Movement is also so fun and easy to master. If you know how to time your movements and memorize the attack patterns of your enemy, you are basically untouchable. No wall is too high to climb if you know how to time the jump and sprint buttons. I almost got through the entire Tanta Sila fight without any damage as I was able to use Frey's boosted jump and dodge tactics to take Sila down from the air. Speaking of the Sila fight, you can get some serious air as you can keep spamming the dodge feature against her fireball spam. - I felt like YouTubers either forgot about the Cuff scan or misused it. Probably one of the best features you can have in the game. You can spot hidden treasures, hidden enemies, and even know their weaknesses by scanning them. - The hidden mazes spread throughout Athia. Nice little detour and reward at the ends of each. - It's very easy to level up and or max out the spell chart. Cons: - The story: It's out of place. I felt that fighting Tanta Sila would be the last thing we would do. But it's not? There's 13 chapters, and we defeat her in Chapter 6. I didn't play after Chapter 6 as the game felt like it was being stretched out - I lost the plot and motivation at this point as well, since the fight was being billed as the fight that would liberate Athia from her control in addition to all its problems from the very beginning of the story. We've done that, and it should be endgame after this. But it's not. - Story Development: Frey does not change from Chapter 1 to Chapter 6. She started as a snobby kid, and she's still a snobby kid. Sure, there's her sacrifices of having to get rid of Homer and losing the kid she was starting to get to know in Athia early, but those events seem more like inconveniences to both her and the player. - The Detours: They are so boring!! I felt like I was being dragged through this sections of the game. You'll get what I mean if you've played this game. The most recent one where you have to dance was boring and also infuriating, as I've timed it perfectly and the game still failed me. - The Rewards and Upgrades: I never found a use or realized any benefits from the treasures I found or upgrades I've made to the gear I have. - Offputting UI: It feels so wrong to look at - it looks like one of those old TVs from the 2000s where everything would appear distorted and warped as you get further from the center of the screen. Also, the confusing health bar - is it that bar underneath the mana, or is it that circle that appears when you're under duress from combat? - The Grading System: It's extremely harsh when it comes to grading you. Yes it's easy to get to S tier, but get hit once and you get sent all the way down to a high B. Also, what's the benefit again? The game promises more XP and damage for the tier you're in, but enemies still take the same amount of time to defeat. - The open world: The most recorded complaint in the game. I won't judge it too harshly as I play Death Stranding, but something feels really off in this game with it having zero NPCs outside of Athia. Sure there's the lore reason of the Corruption, but it seems really off and not really fitting for a game like this. - The voice acting: I didn't overreact to this as much as your favorite YouTuber would. It's only present in the sections they made it a big deal about. What I do have to say about this though is how limited Frey's lines and range can be - I couldn't tell you about how her delivery of lines seem 'off' or how many times I've heard the same voice lines between her and Cuff. Again, I wouldn't judge it too hard, as this is made by Square Enix - the same company that published Life is Strange. - Tying into the voice acting, gameplay seems to be really broken when it comes to transitions and voice lines. Why can't I move while asking Cuff something? Why can't I move after a cutscene and while Frey is talking? Why can I move when talking to one NPC but have to be frozen in place with another? Why do I have to ask Cuff everything you list down? This could have been one whole dialogue, and one without the illusion of choice, where I was able to move freely. Also, I felt that the Forspoken team forgot what in game cutscenes or transitions were as everything has to be a black screen transition. Pet the sheep? Black screen. Talk to Cinta? Black screen. Want to dance with the person in front of you? Black screen. - Without DLSS, Forspoken comes dead last of all the games I have played on PC at an average of 58 FPS. That's important for me to state as I don't play my games with DLSS/FSR/XeSS and without those technologies I get 81-130FPS average. With DLSS, the game still comes dead last at 68 FPS average. It's a shame, as when the game does breakthrough to above 60 FPS in certain scenes, everything is so nice to look at - especially the combat. - To the point above, the game has random dips to unplayable frame rates such as below 30 FPS (I even got to see it run at 11 FPS!!). Something is wrong, as this happens during both gameplay and cutscenes(!!). Also, make sure OBS/NVIDIA ShadowPlay is not fighting the game for resources as the game didn't play too nicely when I started recording the first few times. Overall: 5.5/10. The game has its ups and downs. I'm sad that this game was a victim of unfair judgement and people reviewing it were so negative about it. I'm sad that Square Enix didn't even try to defend this game. I am not sad however that I saw issues with this game firsthand. The concept, graphics, and features are all there. I would love to see this project recycled, made open source, or repurposed - I can see this beautiful engine and game functions (Luminous Engine, I think it is?) being used for a licensed superhero game or something like it.

I really can't understand where all the hate towards this game comes from. I found it extremely enjoyable. The story is an eastern Isekai with many MANY nods to western tales like The Wizard of Oz, with storytelling and dialogues being absolutely anime-coded. The gameplay is fun and entertaining with each set of powers adding a new concept to the combat loop and keeping it fresh. And the art, graphic design and music score are absolutely gorgeous. Standard price is extremely high, but I would 100% recommend it when on sale.

The fluid combat and over all traversal mechanics are some of the most fun in a video game I've ever had the fortune to experience. The combat and parkour traversal meld together to create something seamless and spectacular to play. The designs of many of the enemies are very interesting to look at and fighting groups of them when you have all your magic at your fingertips, makes for some very enjoyable and visually stunning fights. The VFX and effects of everything magic is magnificent and dazzling. I particularly love olas's magic aspect, the green course through fights was mesmerizing to me. I did quite a lot in this game, and the main reason I continuously played it so much was because of these mechanics that made you feel free and fast when wandering the world. Supplementing this were how powerful you can get, and really make you feel as though you've grown, it is very rewarding. There are also some very nicely designed cloaks and necklaces you can adorn the main character Frey with. The majority of the cloaks are very distinct, with many having intricate patterns and appearing in a few colors; red, blue, white, rose, gold, etc. Unlocking them to wear is a fun challenge and adds to the exploration. The necklaces follow the same form, they are pleasing to the eye, some are more ornate than others. I am glad I decided to put so much time into this game, it was an enjoyable experience and I will come back to play it again, the developers did an amazing job with making the game that you play, move, control and experience fun at it's very core. I wish they would continue and build on what they have here. Not many other games offer freedom of action like this, the flow has been carefully crafted and created, and you are able to feel it.